Musings @musicandmeaning.com

I'm dreaming still of who we were.
"He had a theory that musicians are incredibly complex, and know far less than other artists what they want and what they are; that they puzzle themselves as well as their friends; that their psychology is a modern development, and has not yet been understood." – E. M. Forster

Archive for October, 2004


Friday, 29 October 2004

Way to break the curse

Congrats, Red Sox Nation!

For some reason I did not blog about postseason baseball this year, but it was wonderful to see the Dodgers make the playoffs and win at least one game (a complete game shutout, no less), and to see the unbelievable comeback of Red Sox v. Yankees and then Sox v. Cards. Next year, L.A. baseball will be different, but I’ll talk about that later…

Posted at 4:02 am | Filed under Baseball, sports |  

Monday, 25 October 2004

A consensual hallucination

Very cool: I just found out that the writer William Gibson linked to Only Connect (my E. M. Forster site) in his blog entry on Thursday. He talked about Forster and a way Forster has influenced his own writing. "In Forster’s sense of things," Gibson wrote, "I have always tried very hard to not be a ‘political’ novelist." Then he continued to discuss the politics of today. Thanks, Mr. Gibson, for the link.

Of all the sites I’ve ever done (not counting the sites I’ve created for work), Only Connect is by far the most visited and referenced. Prior to that it was my X-Files reviews, but never mind. (Connection alert: For non-X-Philes, Gibson co-wrote the X-Files episodes "Kill Switch" and "First Person Shooter." Hmm.)

In any case, I’m at the point where it’s no longer surprising to see traffic for Only Connect coming in via English departments’ pages, sites for book groups, blogs of people who reference the quote "Only connect" with my site, or sites of fellow Forster fans. A few years ago the site had one of its biggest surges in traffic when The Guardian published an interview with V. S. Naipaul and included a link to Only Connect. Aside from his very homophobic remarks, VSN disparaged A Passage to India and attacked the character of not only Forster but John Maynard Keynes. (I refrain from linking to the interview, but if you really want to read it, a copy is easily found via Google or the Guardian.) I wonder what readers of the article thought, after reading such harsh criticism and then clicking on the link to find my low-key, quiet site on Forster.

If the only thing I accomplish in this life is successfully encouraging people to read more Forster — and having them appreciate and be moved by his work — it’s not a bad accomplishment.


Friday, 1 October 2004

Polly want a new drug

From NPR’s The Tavis Smiley Show: Connie Rice: Top 10 Secrets They Don’t Want You to Know About the Debates. An important read.

And, for something a little different…from MAD magazine’s issue #446: The GWB campaign’s commercial, if Bush were running against Jesus. (Saw the link on a number of sites, including J-Walk Blog)

Posted at 8:41 pm | Filed under News commentary | 1 reply »